Only 11 senators—all Democrats—voted against the confirmation of John Kelly as Department of Homeland Security secretary this past January, where, as Human Rights Watch’s Clara Long notes, Kelly was scarcely asked about immigration, despite the fact that he and Donald Trump would have ultimate say over immigration enforcement. Kelly went on to become his mass deportation accomplice, unshackling immigration agents and striking so much fear in the hearts of immigrants that they’ve stopped reporting when they’ve been victims of violent crime. Now the White House chief of staff, Kelly is gone from DHS but his mass deportation agenda remains, and his replacement, Kirstjen Nielsen, is set to have her confirmation hearing this week. As Long writes in her op-ed, senators already gave a free pass to Kelly. For the sake of immigrant families, they can’t repeat this with Nielsen:
Senators should ask Nielsen whether she intends to continue deporting people like a 39-year-old woman Human Rights Watch recently interviewed shortly after she was deported to Mexico. Since the woman’s deportation, her 9-year-old son, a U.S. citizen, has been living with nuns at a children’s home in Laredo, Tex. “I’ve never been in jail,” the woman said of her 15 years in the United States. “I didn’t drive because I didn’t have a license. I never broke the law except by not having papers.”
Senators should ask Nielsen whether she will stop thoughtlessly ripping families apart without any serious consideration of the harm it causes. Her answer will take on even more urgency as immigrants protected under Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals also become deportable.
Senators should ask Nielsen what she plans to do about the negative impact that immigration enforcement is having on criminal justice. How does she analyze substantial declines in crime reports, including for sexual assault, by Latino communities in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Dallas and Houston? How would she respond to police chiefs and sheriffs who say that if immigrant crime victims fear reporting crimes to the police, it makes all communities less safe? How would she answer judges and others who have criticized immigration arrests at courthouses?
Kelly’s confirmation hearing saw way too many legislators fooled by his shiny military credentials and fake air of decency, at one point even leading North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp to exclaim to his family during his confirmation hearing that "perhaps this is a love-fest that we're having with you today.” Others were more cautious. When Kelly couldn’t promise to protect the 800,000 young undocumented immigrants enrolled in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program from deportation, California Sen. Kamala Harris was out. "I can't look these kids in the face and offer them any guarantee that this guy won't deport them, and without that guarantee I can't support him," she said. She was right.
As the Washington Post has noted, Nielsen’s role during the Bush administration’s handling of the Katrina disaster is already raising plenty of questions about her preparedness. As Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Island remain in crisis, “she would be in charge of a 240,000-employee agency with a $40 billion budget whose many responsibilities include managing disasters such as Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico”:
On Aug 27, 2005, two days before Hurricane Katrina made landfall, officials at the American Red Cross wrote to a top homeland security adviser at the White House, warning that the storm was likely to slam New Orleans as a major hurricane.
The message was sent to Kirstjen Nielsen, whose title was special assistant to the president for prevention, preparedness and response. She was 33 years old.
It was the first of many alarming emails Nielsen would receive over the following days as water poured into New Orleans and the city was deluged. And in the storm of blame that followed the costliest natural disaster in American history, Nielsen’s team was widely criticized for its passive and clumsy response.
There’s no doubt that Kelly, in between shilling for Trump and attacking Gold Star widows and women of color, had a say in dictating who should be his replacement at DHS, and that should be proof enough that it’s Nielsen who needs “extreme vetting.” Does Nielsen share her would-be boss’ white supremacist worldview? If she’s deciding to join this administration, perhaps that question has already been answered to an extent. Will she admit that DHS has in reality not been focusing resources on detaining actual “bad hombres,” but instead arresting grandmas? Will she rein in agents committing egregious acts, like detaining special needs children following emergency surgery? Long says:
Senators should ask Nielsen whether under her leadership, Homeland Security would ensure that asylum seekers are treated fairly in accordance with U.S. and international law — as well as our shared values — when they arrive at our borders.
Our research also shows that asylum seekers forced into U.S. fast-track deportation procedures are regularly sent back without fair consideration of their claims to protection. One Mexican woman, who reported being raped by gang members after she refused to turn over her teenage son, told her lawyer that she tried to seek asylum in the United States early this year. She says a border officer turned her away and told her that people persecuted because they are Christians “are the people we are giving asylum to, not people like you.”
Before he left his post, Kelly and other federal official faced a lawsuit for the actions of border agents, and internal documents later revealed that in the interior, Kelly was orchestrating an anti-immigrant smear campaign to justify Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) raids that were actually sweeping up many immigrants without criminal records. The time for scrutiny is now.
“This is not the time to rubber-stamp a Trump nominee,” Long concludes. “Senators need to know if Nielsen will take the duty of Homeland Security seriously, not only by guarding the border but also by faithfully executing laws designed to protect the most vulnerable who cross onto our soil. Before we grant Nielsen power over this administration’s immigration-enforcement machine, she must first promise to uphold the rights of immigrants.”